Dragonfly
by DarkWarriorMinerva
Summary: It's the year 2064 in Oasis Landing, and a few chance encounters leads Lyra on a convoluted adventure, exposing the identity of the one who really pulls the strings in this world, and a young boy named Wally could be the key to everything, and the secret of the mysterious entity known solely as Dragonfly.


Sixteen-year-old Lyra Loveless was walking down the busy city sidewalk, staring downward at the pavement. She couldn't exactly put into words why, but she felt rather apprehensive tonight. She'd always had a strong sense of intuition her whole life, and she knew full well that there was definitely something amiss.

She stared off into the distance, in the general direction of the apartment complex that she lived in, and let out an annoyed sigh.

"Fuck... I guess that I'll take the monorail home..." she muttered under her breath, after realizing that it was pretty clear that she wouldn't be able to make it home before sundown.

She then made her way to the nearest ZEPHYR monorail station, briefly checking her wallet to make sure her train pass was still there. But as she got on the train, the apprehensive feeling in her heart only grew. Something was definitely wrong here.

As she got off the train, her suspicions her confirmed.

"Stop him!" a voice called out immediately after Lyra stepped off the train. She quickly turned her head and saw a man running from the train car in front of hers and through the station, being chased by ZEPHYR security guards. He was a tall, well-dressed man, and seem rather young despite having gray hair.

"Get him!" one of the guards called out, continuing to chase the man. _What the fuck is going on?!_ Lyra thought to herself.

"You won't get me this time..." the man mumbled with an arrogant smirk on his face. As the guards started to catch up to him, he snapped his fingers and summoned a bit of magic, enveloping him in white smoke and disappearing.

"What the hell happened?!" the guards and bystanders asked themselves, obviously with little to none of the knowledge that Lyra had about magic, which had largely been forgotten with the advancements of science and technology.

"What's going on, anyway?" Lyra asked one of the bystanders.

"That man tried to molest a woman on the train," the woman replied, "I really wish they had caught him. Those kinds of people are the worst of the worst!" she added.

Lyra looked around and noticed a bunch of people crowded around a young woman who appeared to be not much older than herself, with sandy-brown hair and sapphire-blue eyes, wearing a red headband with a red and white bow attached to it, a red and black tank top, and a pair of white shorts with black compression shorts underneath.

_Maybe I should make sure that she's okay..._ Lyra pondered, but decided against it after noticing that everyone else seemed to doing so already.

As she arrived back at her apartment complex and made her way to the floor of her unit, she heard some loud shouting in a voice that she instantly recognized as her insufferable neighbor Norman Daniels, but there was another voice, a much younger-sounding one, one that she had never before.

"You didn't answer my question! Is she here or not?!" the strange voice exclaimed.

Lyra turned the corner of the hallway and saw Norman standing in his front doorway, staring down a teenage boy who was standing opposite of him in the hallway, a brown-haired, brown-eyed boy with a moderately darker complexion than herself, wearing an oversize white beanie attached to a black headband, an orange and black top, gray and black knee-length shorts, and white and green athletic shoes.

"No! She's not here! So fuck off!" Norman retorted.

"So where is she then?!" the boy demanded.

"That's none of your fucking business! Now get outta my sight!" Norman shouted.

"Wait..." the boy replied, "You have no idea where she is, do you?!"

"That doesn't fucking matter, you little fuck!" Norman yelled.

"Some father you are if you can't be bothered to keep tabs on your own daughter!" the boy retaliated.

Norman's eyes flashed in anger as he slapped the boy hard across the face, causing him to wince in pain.

"What the fuck, dude?! That really hurt!" he exclaimed.

"Got the point now, fuckwit?!" Norman roared, "Now take your nigger ass back where it came from and get the fuck outta my face! So fuck you!" he screamed as he slammed the door in the boy's face.

"Are you alright, dude?" Lyra asked the boy as she approached him.

"Yeah. I'm fine. Thanks for asking," the boy responded, smiling slightly.

"So... I don't mean to pry into your business, but... What was that all about, anyway?" she asked.

"Well, I've been searching all over fucking town for my girlfriend, I couldn't find her anywhere, so I decided to check by her father's apartment. Problem is, her father absolutely despises me, so... yeah..." he answered.

"Norman has kids?" Lyra inquired, slightly tilting her head to the right.

"Well, he has a daughter named May, my aforementioned girlfriend, but she lives with her mother," the boy explained.

"Hmm..." Lyra pondered, "I knew that Norman was divorced, but I didn't know that he had a daughter. The more you know, I guess," she then thought for a moment and asked the boy, "What's your name, by the way?

"My name's Brendan Birch," he replied, "It's nice to meet you. What's your name?" he questioned.

"My name's Lyra Loveless," she responded.

Brendan then looked at Lyra and asked, "Have you seen May anywhere? Please tell me you have, I'm really starting to panic here!"

"Why? What's going on?" Lyra questioned.

"I planned on meeting up with May at the Legacy Park for... reasons," Brendan answered sheepishly.

"Reasons, you mean like making out behind a statue?" Lyra added with a warm smile and slight laugh.

"Uh... yeah..." Brendan replied in a slightly embarrassed voice, placing his hand on the back of his head.

Lyra let out another slight giggle, "Yeah, I assumed as much," she said.

"Anyway," Brendan continued, "She didn't show up after an hour of waiting, and she _never_ skips out on me, and that really got me worried, so I decided to check by her house, but her mom told me that she had already head out to meet me, which got me even more even more worried, so I've been scouring the entire fucking city for her, but I couldn't find her anywhere. Have you seen her?"

"Well, I don't exactly know how to answer that," Lyra countered, shrugging slightly, "I don't know what she even looks like."

"Oh yeah..." Brendan returned, looking slightly embarrassed, "Here, lemme show you," he then pulled out his cellphone and pulled up a selfie of him and his girlfriend on screen, causing Lyra to gasp ever so slightly and her eyes to widen somewhat.

"Hey, that was the girl I saw at the ZEPHYR station!" Lyra exclaimed.

"So you _have_ seen her?" Brendan replied.

"Yeah," Lyra responded, "I had just gotten off the train and saw some dude being chased by security, apparently he'd tried to grope her on the train."

"What?!" Brendan exclaimed worriedly, with a look of shock overcoming his face, "Did you see what the asshole looked like?" he asked.

"Actually yes, I did," Lyra replied, "He was pretty tall, at least six feet, and was wearing a black and purple suit, with some sort of weird metal things on the cuffs of his sleeves. Strange thing is, he had gray hair, but he didn't look old at all. I mean, it didn't look like it had been that long since he'd run out of acne cream. Mid twenties at the very oldest..."

"Hmm..." Brendan pondered for a few seconds, then looked at Lyra, "I hate to ask, but... do you think the you could come with me and help me look for May?" he asked.

Lyra was somewhat taken aback by Brendan's request, "But... I barely know you..." she responded shakily.

"I know, Lyra," he replied somewhat hesitantly, "But I just had a feeling that you'd be helpful..."

Lyra contemplated Brendan's request for a few moments, "Okay, I guess that I could..." she stated.

"Great!" Brendan replied, grinning, "Now let's head out!" he added, continuing to wear that smile on his face.

"Hopefully we find her..." Lyra spoke to him as the made their way to the staircase.

"You know, Lyra," Brendan remarked, "I bet that we could end up being pretty good friends..."


End file.
